Kanye West returns to stage for 1st time since antisemitic onslaught

The rapper and designer Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, appeared in concert on Monday for the first time since a series of antisemitic rants last year, as he and his former business partner Adidas continued to move forward after the scandal.

Ye made the surprise appearance onstage at a concert by rapper Travis Scott in Rome at Circus Maximus, a park in the center of the city that was once used for ancient chariot races.

Scott was making the live premiere of his new No. 1 album “Utopia” when he brought his mentor Ye onstage, drawing cheers from the massive crowd.

Footage showed Ye emerging from backstage wearing all black with a black hood, as Scott jumped down from an onstage edifice swathed in smoke.

The pair performed two of Ye’s songs together — “Praise God” and “Can’t Tell Me Nothing.”

Scott introduced Ye as “the greatest” at the show, which was also live-streamed online.

“There is no ‘Utopia’ without Kanye West. There is no Travis Scott without Kanye West,” Scott said.

“There is no Rome without Kanye West. Make some noise for Ye,” he said, drawing chants of “Kanye” from the audience.

Ye’s most recent concert appearance was in Miami in February 2022.

Ye has been mostly quiet since a series of antisemitic outbursts last year online and in interviews saw him espouse Jew-hatred, threaten Jews, praise Adolf Hitler, and call himself a Nazi. He never apologized.

Ye also attended a meeting with former US president Donald Trump and Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes around the same time.

Ye’s rhetoric has been linked to dozens of real-world antisemitic incidents including physical attacks, and widespread Jew-hatred online, the Anti-Defamation League reported.

Ye lost business deals with Adidas, Balenciaga and Gap after his racist offensive.

Ye’s partnership with Adidas was a focus of attention, since the company took time to drop the rapper, as it sought to disentangle its business ties from Ye. His popular Yeezy line of shoes made up a significant chunk of the company’s overall business.

Adidas was left with more than a billion dollars worth of the high-end sneakers with no clear outlet for selling them. Last week, Adidas brought in $437 million from the first release of Yeezy sneakers from the stockpile.

Some of the proceeds will go to groups engaged in fighting antisemitism, earning plaudits from some US Jewish leaders.

X, the company formerly known as Twitter, went in the opposite direction last week, drawing fire from Jewish groups by reinstating Ye’s account, around eight months after it was suspended.

Last fall, Ye tweeted an image that appeared to show a swastika interlaced with a Star of David on Twitter. Owner Elon Musk suspended Ye from the platform, which he had bought weeks earlier.

Musk at the time labeled the Ye post as an “incitement to violence.” He has not commented on returning Ye to the platform.

Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, tweeted that it was “absolutely sickening that antisemite Kanye West was unsuspended from Twitter/X and given a gold verification check mark. He’s done absolutely nothing to make amends.”

Ye has more than 31 million followers on the platform and has not yet posted since his reinstatement.